SGA 2007 Archive

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Seattle Gamers Assemble!

The following SGA games took place or are planned in 2007:


Calico Jack and the crew of the Rapacious

Game System
Savage Worlds
Pitch
Join Captain Calico Jack, the infamous pirate of the early 18th century on a mission of danger, murder, excitement, and BOOTY!
Play Calico Jack, his girlfriend and fierce pirate Anne Bonny, their companion Mary Read, or any other able-bodied free-booting member of Jack's crew on his dread pirate ship Rapacious.
Game Master
Mark Walters
Players
Characters
Date
TBD
Technical Notes
Game World:
Savage Worlds with appropriate skills and weapons for early 1700s pirates. Characters pregenned.
This would be a highly fictionalized (and therefore fun) version of John Rackham aka Calico Jack and his crew. So fictionalized, in fact, that only some of the crew names and Calico Jack's crossed swords Jolly Roger flag are retained. The rest will be wonderful Hollywood movie pirate bunk, in the vein of Pirates of the Caribbean with a little Errol Flynn tossed in for good measure.
Magic:
The characters will certainly be larger than life, but not magical. However, who knows what you'll find? Maybe a voodoo princess, cursed Mayan gold, mermaids... or something completely different.
Recaps
Player Thoughts
Additional GM Thoughts

Incursion

Game System
Savage Worlds (with Modifications)
Pitch
Incursion.jpg
One night, while you were out camping by yourself, you saw a strange light through the trees. "No, it can't be!" you say to yourself, as you see a saucer shaped space craft hovering over a clearing. Grabbing your digital camera you walk up taking pictures, telling yourself that you'll be famous, be a millionaire, that you're about to make first contact...
That's when you're hit with a stun ray and pass out. You hazily remember an alien face looking at you speaking an alien language in a comforting manner, then you went to sleep.
Suddenly you're wide awake, lying naked in a glass tube in a large room with a curving wall. Other people are present, all of whom are in various states of undress. Their skin is a bright fluorescent orange and they are completely hairless as far as you can tell. A quick look confirms that you are the same color and you are also completely hairless, not even eyebrows. A look in some reflective metal shows that you also have a barcode across your forehead.
Two small grey colored aliens with black, almond shaped eyes hand you an ill-fitting jumper and a large bug hands you a weapon.
It then buzzes in fractured English: "Quickly! You muzzz help uzz take over the Ardanna Nuu! They don't know that we have wakened you from your zztaziz zleep! Take ziz gun and help uzz be free!"
Game Master
John Reiher
Players
Characters
Date
April 16, 2007
Technical Notes
Game Rules and mods are on the Incursion Wiki page.
Recaps
Player Thoughts
Additional GM Thoughts

Seven Leagues

Game System
Seven Leagues
Pitch
Game Master
Sophie Lagacé
Players
Characters
Date
April 2, 2007
Technical Notes
Recaps
Player Thoughts
Additional GM Thoughts


Mythic Japan

Game System
(TBD)
Pitch
Game Master
Manu Saxena
Players
Characters
Date
March 26 & April 2, 2007
Technical Notes
Recaps
Player Thoughts
Additional GM Thoughts


The Mute Minstrel

Game System
Faery's Tale
Pitch
Game Master
Cain Young
Players
Characters
Date
March 19, 2007
Technical Notes
Recaps
Player Thoughts
Additional GM Thoughts


Exodus II

Game System
HeroQuest
Pitch
Humankind's last hope... or its last battleground.
Game Master
Johnzo
Players
6
Characters
Inquisitor Ignatius/O Pukepuke (Edmund Metheny)
Quartermaster Barbara McDougall (Meg)
Mining Boss Alice 76 (Laura)
Courier Rokk Razor (Cain)
Engineer Milton Pointdexter (Mark)
Crew Boss Subriya Sumitran (Sophie)
Date
February 26, March 5, April 23 & 30, 2007
Technical Notes
Johnzo: I'd like to run a HeroQuest experiment. The "experiment" part of it is to try to run a zero-prep player-driven game. D&S and 1889 were both heavy prep GM-driven games, so I want an exact change-up from that.
I'm going to make up / steal some mechanics for shared setting and situation creation and moderation and then use them on the 19th, then get a start at play on the 19th and finish things off on the 26th.
My instinct for this is to keep the number of players low by SGA standards so that we'll have a shot at coming out with something coherent. I'd like to cap it at just four players.
If the HeroQuest experiment fails on the 19th, we can refine & retry it on the 26th or fall back to Dungeons & Savages.
Finally, if anyone knows of good collaborative worldbuilding rules, please lemme know about them. I know of PTA's pitch generation and Burning Empires world-burning and ... whatever the hell it was that Aria Worlds tried to do but didn't.
And if anyone's ever done anything like this before, please also chime in. I am especially interested in how to code conflict into the situation.
Recaps
Player Thoughts
Additional GM Thoughts

7th Sea

Game System
7th Sea
Pitch
Game Master
Taylor Leslie
Players
4
Characters
Fideli minstrel (Laura)
Armano, Castillan swordsman (Edmund)
Ilse, Eisen rogue (Megan)
Artemise Soulier, Montaigne Rilasciare (Sophie)
Date
February 19, 2007
Technical Notes
Recaps
Player Thoughts
Additional GM Thoughts

Roanoke

Game System
Wushu: Roanoke
Pitch
1587: A small group of English colonists establish a settlement on Roanoke Island
1590: The colony is found completely abandoned with no trace of the colonists.
What happened? Find out!
Game Master
Edmund Metheny
Players
8
Characters
Reverend Ezekiel Parris, Fire-and-Brimstone Preacher (Cain)
Lady Charity de Warwick, Pirate Hunter (Sophie)
Haunce Walters, Devious deck hand and opportunist (Mark)
Miss Emme Merrimoth, Dorset Farmgirl (Laura)
Braith Madog, Unhangable Loner (Johnzo)
Paiyn, Runaway Slave Child (Kevin)
Alice Langston, Feisty Widow (Meg)
Thomas "the Butcher" Vessel, Redeemed Convict (Taylor)
Date
February 5 & 12, March 12, & April 9, 2007
Technical Notes
This game is intended to be a Lost-style recurring series, with characters drawn from the pool of colonists and local Tribes as needed to accomodate new or occasional players.
Recaps
Player Thoughts
Johnzo: My favorite part was when the Rev. and Haunce faced off over the missing grain. I liked how the conflict dicing allowed the characters to showcase their traits, and I really liked how the players regarded the issue as suspended after the dicing was done. I was worried that it was going to degenerate into more rounds of "well, I can't get him with this skill, maybe I'll try this skill." Instead, the point was made, the issue put off to another day, and tensions increased.
I thought the large ensemble worked well, with people patiently waiting through downtime. One thing that might help even more in this regard is aggressive scene framing, where people state their objectives at the front of the scene, and as soon as the scene either denies or confirms those objectives, we move on to another thing. I don't know how that fits with people's gaming tastes, though. And it's not that I think there's a problem, but I'm always in favor of experimenting to try to redline my gaming. :)
Also on the topic of the big ensemble, it was one of my goals to reduce its effective size by establishing a subunit for Braith to work in. I thought this would be with Haunce, but instead it was with Kev's character, and that strikes me as good and natural.
Like so many of my characters, Braith didn't really reveal himself until actual play started. I'm thinking that instead of "gentle" his Social trait should be "knows he is destined for something special." This makes him somewhat resistant to fear, but also makes him a little cold and fatalistic and weird.
I think that Braith's essential struggle will pit his aloof and destined nature against the human connections he'll generate on the island, most notably with the little slave kid, whose name he has still not learned, and with his aborted hatred of the absent Ferdinando. In a way, fostering Kev's character is his way at striking back at Ferdinando. I also want to keep his deference to Haunce, I don't know why, but this feels like an interesting choice.
Speaking of Haunce, I'm super glad for Mark's desperate attempts to push everyone's buttons. My favorite horror stories are siege tales like Stephen King's "The Mist" or "Battlestar Galactica" where the external horror is balanced by an internal horror of people coming apart under enormous stress. Haunce is the driver of that internal horror right now. I think he's the central character of the tale. What we do with him will be very interesting.
Mark: My favorite part was hitting the doom button to keep everyone from discovering Haunce's secret. He's so terrified of this, that he'll go to some lengths to protect himself, even though it might spell disaster for others. This makes for an interesting conflict, because he doesn't really want the colony to fail. At heart, he's not a bad guy, he's just weak, and it will be his undoing.
Roleplaying is fun :) I'm glad Cain didn't back off when he had the chance. Rev. Parris both scares and fascinates Haunce. Given the chance, Haunce will try to suck up to him because of the influence he weilds in the colony.
It would make sense for the others to become involved in the Haunce-Ezekiel conflict. Braith, for example, might develop a distrust of Haunce. Emme might become an ally or an exasperated enemy, depending on how Laura plays her. It would be fun to expand the stand-off.
Haunce He's the kind of guy who either ends up being the charismatic leader, or gets locked up in stocks and has rotten vegetables thrown at him. Or both. It's a fine line between greatness and gitness, and "great" men tend to be really just successful or lucky con artists. One only needs to look towards Commodore John Paul Jones in our own history to see an example of that. Or General Benedict Arnold. Or Vice President Aron Burr. Haunce is a bird of their flock, just born into more modest circumstances.
Doing this in scenes is really working well, and a nice break from the usual "Okay what's the party's marching order?" kind of roleplaying. As we play (and I'm sure Ed intended this), I'm thinking about what my character would be doing as if this were a movie or a play. I'm imagining cut-scenes, fades, swipes, dramatic music, even camera angles. I might try describing my actions more in those terms next week.
I thought the roleplaying was all great... especially that done by Meg (Alice) and Kevin (Paiyn). It's been a while since I've been in a game that captured everyone's imagination the way this one has.
Mechante Anemone: I really liked the atmosphere, including the use of environmental sound and candle lighting.
Additional GM Thoughts

The Terror of the Polywampus

Game System
Homebrew
Pitch
Gather round young'uns and listen to me tale, the tale of mutants and science gone wrong. Up the river from here is the Hanford Nuclear Plant, where they made the atomic bomb and other devices of nuclear devastation!
In the early days of Hanford, they were nay concerned with the toxic waste they created and much of it was dumped into a leach pond. Into this pond some ducks settled, but most died horribly from the radiation.
But two of these ducks survived and mated. They laid a clutch of eggs, eggs that glowed at night. All but one of these eggs failed, but the last one, it hatched an abomination. It hatched the monster known as the…
Polywampus!
This foul beast was nay a duck, but a throwback to great beasts that once roamed the Earth's prehistory! It was born hungry and it et it's parents, then anything else it could corner: Jack rabbits, coyotes, and other critters. It grew and grew to an enormous size, bigger than a Clydesdale! It's bill is lined with sharp pointed teeth, and it's body is covered with green and brown feathers.
It can chase you into the Columbia river and hunt you down, it can climb the sides of the valley snap your legs off! It can run faster than you can, and it will eat you whole! The only warning you'll get is it's cry:
Wauuugh! Wauuugh!
You hear that lads, it's too late…
Wauuugh!
What's that? Did you make that noise?
Wauuugh! **Thoom** **Thoom**
It canna be!
WAUUGH!
It's the Polywampus! Run! Run! Aieeee!
**CRUNCH**
You're a Boy Scout or a Girl Scout, and a giant, mutant Duck Monster just ate your Scout Leader. Can you defeat the Polywampus?
Game Master
John Reiher, AKA Kedamono
Players
Wanted 6, got 2, but they proved to be enough.
Characters
Friedrich Von Trapp: James
The Barrio Kid: Cain
Date
February 10, 2007
Technical Notes
This is also a playtest of John's new RPG rules, the Pulp RPG System, so it's double the fun and double the pleasure. There's room for 6 players of all ages, and you'll be creating your characters at the game, just remember, they are kids, between 10 and 15 years old, out in the great outdoors!
Recaps
As playtests go, this one was success... it was the game that came up short. The two testers, Cain and his friend James did a thorough job of questioning my assumptions on how things work in my game. Since this was an alpha test, not a full blown playtest, that was to be expected. The system I used for doing task resolution was, well, clunky. What sounds good on paper, absolutely fails in an actual game play.
First thing was that the supposedly unkillable monster, the muntant duck, the Polywampus, was dead easy to kill in two rounds of combat, with weapons such as a pellet pistol and even more deadly, a slingslot. That was a shocker, the slingshot was far more deadlier than the pellet gun, in fact, it was deadlier than a heavy pistol that I had defined.
The fact that it was so simple for the players to kill the critter, points to a major flaw in the rules. It should have been more of a challenge, not a boys day out killing a duck. Even my red shirt NPCs were invulnerable! The polywampus bit one with a critical bite, and then the red shirt made a critical toughness roll and took no damage!
So in closing, the rules did do what they were supposed to do, but they had unexpected side effects that made the game both deadly and hard to kill people with. I have to redo the rules and change the playtest so that it checks more things from the rules.
Thanks again to my playtesters!
Player Thoughts
Additional GM Thoughts

Savage Lorax

Lorax.jpg
LARGE
Game System
Savage Worlds
Pitch
In the land of the Lorax
Where the Truffula grows
Sits the greedy old Once-ler
And his band of fellows
His business is the Thneed
A right ridiculous thing
It makes him so wealthy
He's nigh near a king!
But the Thneeds are a problem
For the Truffula woods
Because they waste all the Truffula tufts
For the sake of consumer goods!
But that's not all
The old Once-ler perpetrates
No, he's a right robber baron
Who's put us in dire straits!
He catches the Swomee-Swans
And bakes them with honey
He skins the brown Bar-ba-loots
And tans their hides for money
He fries up the Humming-fish
And serves them will dill
There is no creature, that for a few coins
He will not cheerfully kill
He chops down the trees
The woods he will exhaust
Until the landscape becomes
A de-Truffula'd holocaust
Will you do something about it?
Will you fight for our cause?
Will you help the Lorax
Undo Once-ler's faux pas?
Will you help stop his factories?
Will you help stop his axes?
Will you gum up his operations
Tap his whisper-ma-phone? Read his faxes?
Make no delay!
Now you've heard the pitch!
Turn right at Weehawken!
Sharp left at North Nitch!
Together we can stop him!
We must act today!
For if we don't, my friends
The Lorax will be lifted away!
And then it will be too late.
...
I've been playing around with the Savage Worlds book (Thanks Ed & Sophie), and I'd like make a Savage Worlds Lorax game, for two nights in January, if anyone's up to it.
The setting:
Truffula Woods near the headquarters of Once-ler, Inc. Old Once-ler is busy chopping down Truffula Trees for their tufts to make the latest consumer product fad: The Thneed. "You need a Thneed"
The problem:
Between the industrial smog, the toxic sludge and cutting down the trees, he's killing off the critters that live there: Brown Bar-ba-loots, Swommee Swans, and Humming Fish. And to make matters worse, he's catching the critters, skinning and cooking them, and selling them for profit!
The solution:
The Lorax, who speaks for the trees (for the trees have no tongues), is taking matters into his own hands. He's recruiting a band of brave heroes to go toe-to-stocking with Once-ler and his cronies, and put an end to his nefarious practices once and for all!
Game Master
Mark Walters
Players
8
Characters
Cara Pace - Yertle (Laura)
Marvin MacMalapert - Star-bellied-sneech (Ed)
Frolicia Fay O'Friskle - Brown Bar-ba-loot (Sophie)
Sam I Am - Who (Taylor)
Pequod Picaroon the Pirate - Humming Fish (Kevin) (first episode)
Fokker McScud - Swomee Swan (Cain)
Cindy Lou Who - Who (Meg)
Son-celer - Once-ler traitor (John Reiher)
Date
January 22 & 29, 2007
Technical Notes
Players will be able to choose a race to play, either Bar-ba-loot, Humming Fish, Swommee Swan, Star-Bellied-Sneech, Who, or Yertle.
Recaps

Part 1

Shosuro Kando:
Marvin MacMalapert, bastard for hire
Got a note from the Lorax - he answered by wire
The note was quite simple, it said "Please meet me
Quite near to the stump of a truffula tree."
Marvin spit grickle grass out of his gob
But thinking about it, he needed a job
His rent had would come due soon, and business was slow
And provisions of Barbaloot whiskey were low!
So Marvin set off for his stump rendezvous
at the edge of the forest where trees were now few
He got to the place, but then squinted to see
The whole of a Seussian thug company!
The psychotic Yertle known as Cara Pace
Who's Moseymotiller lost many a race
And sweet Cindy Lou Who, a killer at heart
With ornament-fu, she took people apart!
There was Fokker McScud, who's razor sharp beak
Unspeakable mayhem and havoc would wreak
Little Frolicia Fay O' Friskle with darts
Could poison her enemies, then stop their hearts.
And Piquod Picaroon, a pirate so cruel
He killed off his crew with tyrannical rule
The serial killer who was called Sam-I-Am
Who ate all his victims, with green eggs and ham
And puffing a bong by a truffula tree
The worstest of all by a factor of three
There was Sonceler Onceler, who's wicked machines
Would torture his victims, then rip out their spleens!
"Holy shit!" exclaimed Marvin, as dread filled his guts
"I thought I was hardcase, but these guys are nuts!
The lorax is crazy to hire this crew
I think he's been huffing some trufflula glue!"
But prior to Marvin just dumping the lot
The Lorax appeared on his specified spot
His pug ugly mug wrinkled into a frown
And he told how the Oncelers were cutting trees down
The Lorax explained that he spoke for the trees
(And Marvin, aghast, covered up with a sneeze)
The trees wanted killers, the Lorax then said
To bust a fat cap in the Onceler's dumb head!
Marvin (who'd been planning to get himself gone)
Realized he was stuck cuz the hit was now on!
If he tried to leave now, he knew for a fact
This mob of stone killers would just have him whacked.
He turned to the Lorax to ask about pay
And discovered the lard ass had faded away
Apparently thinking his crew'd do the thing
Without even getting a taste of some bling!
His snubulous popper he loaded with care
Then climbed up a Truffula tree that was there
If he made a false move he was sure he was dead
So he drank himself into a stupor instead.
The very next morning the carnage was started
before the last dew of the night time departed
The Truffula choppers arrived to chop trees
but were killed by the group with the greatest of ease
The Oncelers died screaming, and some tried to flee
Their luck it was bad, their escape not to be.
Mangled or stabbed, strangled, poisoned or shot
The group spared not one of the Oncelery lot.
A few drove away with mechanical speed
And called out the watch to take care of their need.
The watch sent out Oncelers with badges of tin
And butterfly nets to catch criminals in.
Meanwhile Sonceler Onceler had taken the gear
The Oncelers were using the forest to clear
And had mashed it all up to create a new thingy
A mechanical Onceler eviscera-dinghy!
The cops then approached with their nets held up high
And almost at once they all started to die.
Just one Onceler was spared, the rest napped in dirt
Not one of the murderous party was hurt.
Marvin MacMalapert went through it all
Discovered he isn't a bastard at all
He thought of himself as cold-hearted and mean
He'll have nightmares for years now, from all that he's seen.
And though he has never been truly devout
He prays to Doc Seuss now to just get him out!
Because these guys are CRAZY!
 
Mechante Anemone: Cindy Lou Who, Pequod Picaroon the Humming Fish, Marvin MacMalapert the Star-Bellied Sneech, Sam I Am the Who, Cara Pace the Yertle, Fokker McScud the Swomee Swan, Frolicia Fay O'Friskle the Brown Bar-ba-loot, and Son-celer the Once-ler traitor came to the Super Secret Ecoterrorist Camp to fight the Once-ler deforesting the land. They were about to give up when finally, just as the sun was setting, the Lorax appeared on a stump, with a mighty "Gazompf!"
He looked around and seeing no mighty army but a rag-tag band of idealists, loafers or mercenaries, frowned. Since they did not have an army, he said, they would have to spy on the enemy and use cunning tactics. They must go find out what the Once-lers' weaknesses were! Then he disappeared as suddenly as he had appeared. It was dark, so Fokker and Pequod's effort to scout were fruitless.
It was during Cindy Lou Who's watch that a rumbling sound was heard to the north. Frolicia recognized it as the sound of the big machines that destroyed the truffula tree forests! The eight ecoterrorists went to look for the source of the noise. Sneaking over the last hill, they saw the axiswhatsis, a whirling circular machine whose twirling axes chomped on truffula tree trunks as they spun.
Marvin took aim and winged the Once-ler piloting the mechanical monster; Cara charged in her moseymotiller, and Sam I Am swung form a truffula tree into the Once-ler's turret. Then there was the contraption built by Son-celer Once-ler to battle the axiswhatsis — it was a thing or terror and truffula trunks!
At Pequod's suggestion -- he had seen similar contraptions on whalers, he said -- little Frolicia snuck under the axiswhatsis and climbed aboard through a hatch. She blew a poisoned dart at the Once-ler and he collapsed! The ecoterrrorists seized control of the axiswhatsis. Pequod was able to pilot the machine, if gingerly.
While they were discussing whether to sneak in or destroy the equipment, they spotted another rumble. Fokker, Marvin and Sam went to scout, and found another machine, a loggamajammer picking up truffula tufts felled by the axiswhatsis. They charged it! Cara, with passengers Cindy and Son-celer, rushed in behind. They brutally killed the Once-ler pilot.
As they were commandeering the second machine, they suddenly realized that three more loggamajammers were coming over the hill! But Cindy Lou Who got on the radio and completely confused the Once-lers, assuring them that everything was fine. Once the other loggamajammers were gone, the team decided to destroy the captured loggamajammers and continue toward the Once-ler HQ with the axiswhatsis and Cara's moseymotiller.
They met with six large Once-lers armed with butterfly nets (scary, huh?); the Once-ler tried to capture a prisoners. The ensuing carnage was frightful. Cindy Lou Who and Fokker McScud, in particular, dealt death to numerous Once-lers. One managed to escape, but one was captured and interrogated by Fokker (covered in the blood of the other Once-lers.) The prisoner said that after receiving a confusing message, the Once-lers had suspected an ecoterrorist attack and were trying to gain intelligence of enemy activity by capturing one of the Lorax's allies.
Sneaking and learning things and cunning tactics? So much for that idea. Hey there, diddle diddle, straight up through the middle.
  • Some of the best quotes:
    • "You're not Sam, you're Son of Sam!" — Marvin/Edmund to Sam/Taylor.
    • "He's a pilot fish!" — Marvin/Edmund and Frolicia/Sophie, when Pequod took control of the axiswhatsis.
    • "I will serve you green eggs and ham!" — Sam/Taylor
    • "You're a mean one!" — Cindy/Meg, smashing a Once-ler to smithereens with her Christmas ornament.


Part Deuss

Mechante Anemone: An army of Once-lers and loggamajammers was approaching! While Sonce-ler was setting their own loggamajammer (damaged) and axiswhatsis on rudimentary auto-pilot and sending them against the Once-lers, the rest of the ecoterrorists hopped onto Cara Pace's moseymotiller (except Pequod who remembered he was a fish and needed water.) Sonce-ler caught up with them after jumping off.
They took a circuitous route to the Once-ler headquarters, figuring they would be almost deserted, and parked in the Once-ler of the Month spot. They walked into a large factory where truffula trees were being stripped, the fruit discarded into poisonous waste, and the tufts were turned into thneeds. At the far end was a control pane; that looked like a big pipe organ. Next to it was a big red button labelled "Do not push".
While Sam was alertly watching for an ambush, Marvin decided that everyone does indeed need a thneed and equipped himself with a thneed fedora and trenchcoat. Frolicia was salvaging still-edible (for a Brown Barbaloot) truffula fruit. Cindy Lou, Fokker and Sonce-ler raced to press the big red button labelled "Do not push".
All sorts of alarms went off! The floor split open from the door to the control panel; Sam, Cindy Lou, Sonce-ler, and Cara started falling toward a chute! Fokker simply flew off. Cindy Lou was nimble enough to jump away. Sonce-ler held on to the control panel, and Cara barely caught the edge of the receding floor, suspended above the chute and yelling for help. Sam used his springulous slapper to hang from the ceiling above the chute.
Cindy Lou and Marvin began throwing bins of thneed down the chute, and this cause a faint cry for help to ring. While Frolicia was trying to help Cara up, Fokker pressed the button again! the floor trap shut quickly, sending Cara bouncing and landing on her back. But Sam was suspended from the ceiling in the chute under the now-closed floor! Sonce-ler pressed the button a third time to re-open the trap, and Marvin resumed throwing bins of thneed. Sam made a thneed rope and threw it to the prisoner at the bottom of the chute, who turned out to be Thing Two. Both Sam and Thing Two were now hanging from the ceiling above the chute, so Fokker flew over to grab the thneed rope and pull them to the side.
Sam questioned Thing Two, a painful process. He learned that the Cat in the Hat had been captured by the Once-lers while trying to negotiate, and was kept under the Lurker tower. Sonce-ler started playing with the controls. The place became dangerous as machines went crazy and smoke rose, so everyone else fled.
They went to the Lurker tower and climbed to the top, where they found a well-appointed office. After scaring the secretary and making her fall down the stairs, Marvin and Cindy Lou hit the fine gricklegrass cigars in the humidor. On the desk they found the plans for a war machine, as well as a forged letter addressed to the president of Here (also known as There) and incriminating the nation of There (who called themselves Here) as trying to start a war.
There were many portraits of famous Once-lers; behind the portrait of Sponce-ler Once-ler, Sam found a secret button. He pressed it and a secret door was revealed. They found the Cat in the Hat, chained to the wall, very thing and mangy-looking. Frolicia unlocked his manacles and Cindy Lou got herself swallowed up by the Hat.
Sonce-ler's efforts had set the thneed factory on fire, so they all ran back to the Truffula Woods. The Lorax talked to the Cat in the Hat, examined the evidence retrieved by the ecoterrorists, and announced that he would next send the team to the Hierarch of There (or Here) to inform him of the deception.
  • Some of the best quotes:
    • "It's Fokker's Pendulum." - Frolicia/Sophie.
    • Cindy Lou/Meg: "I thought the Cart in the Hat was an infamous crime lord?"
      Sam/Taylor: "Cindy Lou Who, you've watched too much 'Law and Order'!"
      Marvin/Edmund: "No, she's right. The cat is responsible for the entire mystal creth distribution network in the area."
Player Thoughts
  • Mechante Anemone:
    • Mark did an awesome Seuss job.
    • The minis Johnzo had made for the Savage Lorax game were absolutely fantastic. I think they really added a lot.
    • John Reiher built his war machine contraption at the table, using a stack of chopsticks as truffula tree trunks. It was really neat.
    • As Marvin MacMalapert, Edmund had to speak in whupass rhymes throughout the game -- and he did.
    • We're so bloodthirsty, Dr. Seuss must be crying.
Additional GM Thoughts

Dungeon & Savages: Against the Lord of Blood

Aaron, Longrinn, and Fat Bastard attacking the Lord of Blood
Game System
Savage Worlds
Pitch
Your party is now approaching the Village of Hommlet, having ridden up from lands of the Wild Coast. All you have is what you wear and wield, plus the few coins that are hidden in purses and pockets. What you do possess in quantity, though, is daring and desire to become wealthy and famous. Thus your group comes to Hommlet to learn. Is this indeed a place for adventurers to seek their fortunes? You all hope, of course, to gain riches and make names for yourselves. The outcome of this is uncertain, but your skill and daring, along with a good measure of luck, will be the main ingredients of what follows, be it for weal or woe!
The dusty, rutted road is lined with closely-grown hedges of brambles and shrubs. Here and there it cuts through a copse or crosses a rivulet. To either hand, forest and meadow have given way to field and orchard. A small herd of kine graze nearby, and a distant hill is dotted with the wand stone chimneys with thin plumes of blue smoke rising from them. A road angles west into the hill country, and to either side of the road ahead are barns and buildings — Hommlet at last!
But who is this? You hear a cry for help from the direction of the mountain road. Investigating, you walk up the mountain road to the next hillock, where you discover a man crumpled in the rise between the wheel ruts. You judge him a villager, by his simple, sturdy clothes. And, by the bloodstains on that garb, and by the cuts on the sturdy staff that lies next to him, you also judge that he has recently seen a fight...
Game Master
Johnzo
Players
8
Characters - "The Five Swell Gals"
Longrinn the human paladin (Mark Walters)
Mykk the half-Orc fighter (Edmund Metheny)
Aaron the half-Elf ranger (Laura)
Lyle the Elf bard (Taylor)
Sianica the human thief (Kayobi - first episode)
Fat Bastard the Dwarf Cleric (Kristian)
Petunia the Halfling druid (Sophie) and her dog Martha
Sammy Topbottom the Gnome thief/magic user (Meg)
Date
January 8 & 15, 2007
Technical Notes
Power stunting rule: Make a raise and you can narrate your result.
Recaps

Part 1

Mechante Anemone: With five female players, the ladies had a majority and successfully voted in the name "The Five Swell Gals" for the party (after all, the Five Swell Guys weren't all guys.) Yes, we did notice there were more than five of us -- how about the Seven Sentinels who were really nine? Yeah, I read way too many Alan Moore comics. :)
So the Five Swell Gals found the aforementioned pesant who had been badly beaten, and decided to take him to nearby Hommlet to get some care. They soon learned that he was the only survivor of a party of fifteen villagers who had ventured up in the mountains to retrieve young Horace, a 12-year old boy who had been somehow lured to a little-known monastery.
Apparently, Young Horace was a quiet boy, his widowed father's only child and support. Old Horace (the father) was legless, and relied on his helpful son to get around and take care of his modest farm. But a few weeks before, a two-headed calf had been born to one of their cows. Young Horace took it to the local druid so that she would read the omen, but when she decreed that the calf must be sacrificed, the boy had refused and instead hidden the calf in the forest. Then Young Horace had suddenly started developping an interest in the abbey in the mountains, declaring that he wanted to join the monastery. Eventually, the boy had run away to the abbey. His father was upset and when a group of villagers went to demand that he be returned, they discovered that the monks had hired a band of Orcs, the Twisted Tooth, as mercenaries to defend the monastery.
Old Horace and the villagers pleaded with the Five Swell Gals to help -- and the rumour that the monks were sitting on a huge treasure trove didn't hurt either. Although a crabby Petunia complained that they should be doing a little more ground work first, the group charged up the mountain, with Longrinn and Mykk taking point.
When they reached the monastery in the crags, they indedd found it defended by Orcs. Sammy cast a spell to plunge the (previously damaged) gate area in darkness (Obscure). Erin and Sianica climbed over the walls, Petunia burrowed under the foundations, and the rest swarmed through the broken gate.
  • An epic fight ensued, where some of the highlights included:
    • Lyle the bard waded through the fray (using Mykk as cover) and took no damage, while Sammy scurried into a building to hide and was turned into a pincushion by archers.
    • Lyle used her Fear spells (singing heavy metal) to rout large mobs of monks and Orcs.
    • Longrinn the paladin had the worst luck with his dice, worse even that Aaron the ranger, and that takes a lot of effort.
    • Martha the dog managed to horribly maul an Orc on her first attack (and then never rolled anything higher than a 2).
    • Petunia burrowed under the Orc leader Hakka's feet and dragged him halfway into the ground as a "weasel attack."
    • Ganging up on Hakka allowed the group to chip at him effectively.
    • Speaking of effectiveness, Aaron (despite a series of disappointing rolls at one point) showed that he was just as effective with a bow as he was as the two-sword Cuisinart.
    • Mykk was a tank, as expected, and bagged Hakka after many blows.
    • Sianica was a true "death from above" ninja and also managed to claim credit on others' kills!
    • Fat Bastard would rather stay in the middle and risk taking Mykk's "friendly fire" than miss a fight.
    • Longrinn can take quantities of damage that would squish several of the other heroes, and barely notice -- which is good, 'cause he sure took a lot of blows.
Eventually the Orcs were annihilated and Longrinn and Mykk brushed off the monks who were trying to bar the way to the treasure chamber. An immense pile of gold was in the center of the large room; although Longrinn could feel serious evil vibes, they seemed to come from the room, not the gold.
Going gold-mad, Sammy threw herself face-first in the treasure, having gone to Gnome heaven. Swimming in gold, she reached for a single coin -- and as soon as she grabbed it, the room started filling with blood. Meanwhile, outside, Petunia found Young Horace in a cell. Gleeful, the boy was shouting: "He comes! The master comes!" A gigantic, shapeless tentacled monster emerged from the gold.
The monks wailed in despair. Longrinn managed to extract an explanation from them: the Lord of Blood had long ago been imprisoned here and for 3,000 years, the abbey's monks had been keeping him/it imprisonned by making sacrifice of all earthly pleasures and riches, denying themselves every comfort. But recent omens and a planetary alignment had allowed the Lord of Blood to contact a receptive victim and call to Young Horace. The monks had hoped to keep the boy locked up and prevent him from aiding the Lord of Blood; because of his age, they could not bring themselves to hurt Horace. But the first act of greed committed in the room had freed the Lord of Blood!

johnzo: Like The Voyage of the Olympic I'd planned this to be another "Pottery Barn" game where in the first session, the PCs would be induced to break something, and in subsequent sessions, they would have to deal with the fallout of that breakage. So I was very happy with the Lord of Blood's emergence in Session 1.

Part 2

Mechante Anemone: A fierce battle broke out, as Longrinn, Fat Bastard, Mykk, Aaron and a bunch of angry monks tried to prevent the Lord of Blood from getting out of the treasure room. Sianica was grabbed by a tentacle and devoured by the LoB! (on account of player no-show.) Meanwhile, Sammy explored the abbey for something helpful, Lyle retreated to the library to find the book about the Lord of Blood, and Petunia talked to Young Horace.
Petunia had really meant to kill off Young Horace before he could help the LoB complete his ritual, but upon hearing that Young Horace was hoping to find a way to heal his old father through a bargain with the LoB, she didn't have the heart. Instead, she let him out and started trying to steer him out of the monastery, so she was too distracted to stop her dog Martha to run off and join the fray in the treasure room.
While the fight raged on, with the Five Swell Gals hacking at tentacles that kept growing back, Lyle found the Book of Eville and brought it out to the light, but could not decipher it. Sammy, tired of being pursued by an angry little monk belittling him for his part in allowing the Lord of Blood to break his bonds, decided to join the battle and attack the LoB with fire.
Longrinn stopped blow after blow from the Lord of Blood, his shield dented beyond recognition. Mykk fought hard, but was eventually captured by the LoB's tentacles and dragged toward the waiting maw. Mykk used this new-found closeness with divinity to go berserk and deal the LoB several painful blows. The combined efforts of all those fighting on the side of Good-and-Not-Being-Eaten, and particularly Mykk's berserker rage, caused the LoB several wounds. A little monk, full of admiration for Mykk's brave fighting, tried to pull him out but instead was pulled in with the Half-Orc to be devoured by the enemy.
Just as Mykk, still suspended in the air by tentacles, was being dropped in the LoB's gullet, Aaron of the Two-Sword Cuisinart dealt the LoB the mortal blows. The hellish creature shivered; Fat Bastard and Longrinn combined their powers to Turn it, and the LoB collapsed in a puddle of ichor and tentacle bits. But Martha the dog plunged into the puddle as it bubble away, and could not be found again afterwards.
Although the Lord of Blood was gone, Longrinn could still feel evil inside the treasure room, its very walls, and some of the gold. Then animals started arriving from the surrounding mountain forest, trooping inside the treasure chamber around the debris. Questioned by Sammy and Petunia, they kept saying the "Spring is coming."
The monks decided to disband since their task was over, except for the one who had been so impressed by Mykk and asked to become his apprentice. Fat Bastard and Sammy went down to Hommlet to take Young Horace back to his father and look for a scholar and a wizard to read the Book of Eville. Although the priest at the local Temple of St. Cuthbert was very happy to help sequester the tainted gold, no one could be found to read the book, not even at the viscount's castle.
But Aaron found the local druid dead, beyond a breech in a hastily thrown barrier of thorns; she appeared to have been gored by an animal, probably a boar. None of this did much to improve the sense that the Five Swell Gals had not succeeded as brilliantly as they had hoped. They elected to keep watch on the place while looking for someone to decipher the book and until "spring" came.
Lyle finally got impatient. She decided to walk into the erstwhile treasure room, where the animals were still waiting, and cut her hand, letting the blood fall to the floor. The resulting tremor alerted the rest of the group, who rushed to the treasure room with weapons drawn.
In the center stood Martha the dog. The animals started advancing toward her; when a squirrel reached her, she gave it a friendly lick — and it sprouted bat wings and flew off. A steer approach next, was licked, and had its antlers turn to serpents.
But Petunia, not the sharpest tool in the shed, ran in and, recognizing her companion, ran to embrace Martha. Though her features momentarily wavered when Martha licked her, she seemed unaffected. She brought Martha out of the treasure room — where Longrinn slew the dog on the spot, then the steer. But the squirrel could not be found...
Epilogue: Days later in Greyhawk, a large city with its generous share of vermin, pigeons and rats gathered around a bat-winged squirrel...
Player Thoughts
  • Mechante Anemone: Some favourite quotes:
    • "You forgot to call me a fool this turn!" — Sammy to the angry little monk
    • "We're about to be the Four Swell Gals." — Lyle
    • GM: "These are the front tentacles..."
      Petunia: "And Longrinn's being attacked by the ass tentacles."
    • "I have him right where he wants me!" — Mykk, dragged to his (near) doom by the LoB
    • Lyle: "We must disperse this evil gold so it can't do any more harm."
      Longrinn: "Yeah, you'd like that."
    • Petunia: "The druid is a halfling, so she can hardly have been gored by something large like a steer."
      Mykk: "Maybe it was a dyk-dyk."
    • GM: "But how do you track a flying squirrel?"
      Longrinn: "First, you need a really large moose."
Additional GM Thoughts
Johnzo: Against The Lord of Blood: The Photonovel.


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